Cake Cookies From Box Mix

Hey everyone

These cookies are soft, cakey, and easy enough to make with your kids, but look good enough for a bake sale! Here I'll show you how to do the recipe straight, then I'll show you how you can mix it up and make these yours!
Yield: I got 13 big cookies out of the vanilla, and 16 out of the chocolate mint cookies with each being roughly 3T of batter each. If you bake smaller cookies (I suggest 1 oz/2T scoopers), you'll get more.

To make these cookies, you'll need:
1 box of your cake mix of choice
The oil required for the mix by the instructions on the back (usually around 1/2 cup vegetable oil)
2 large eggs (usually one less than the mix asks for)
Mix-ins (optional)

Tools:
Oven
Bowl
Spatula/spoon
Sheet pan
Parchment paper (you can grease the pan if you don't have it)
1oz/2T - 1.5oz/3T scoop/disher (VERY helpful tool for making all the cookies the same size/shape)

Read the instructions on the back of the box to find out the temperature you should bake your cookies at. In this case, it was 350℉, so that's what I set my oven to, but some box mixes say 325-275, so make sure to double check.

Add all the oil and your 2 eggs, and mix until a wet dough consistency. You should be able to cut the dough with a spatula easily. It should be scoopable, but not pourable.

A disher, the thing that looks like a little ice cream scoop, is an invaluable tool for making all your cookies exactly the same size and shape (mostly useful for bake sales and keeping the kids from arguing over who got the bigger cookie). I use a 1.5oz (about 3 tablespoons) disher here, but you can just as easily use a couple spoons and a watchful eye.
Lay a piece of parchment paper on the cookie sheet, and dose your cookie dough out about 2 inches apart. These cookies spread a bit in the oven.

Slide your cookie sheet into the preheated oven and follow the timing for cupcakes. Mine took roughly 14 minutes a batch, You want to look for golden brown edges on vanilla cookies, and chocolate cookies should look dry on the outside (tricky, but I usually have good luck with the midpoint cook time).

Let the cookies cool on their parchement on a cooling rack or on the counter for 15 minutes before eating. They are VERY fragile fresh out of the oven (just that curled paper left an indent on the cookies in the picture). If you're cooling them on the pan, take them out a little early and let cool on the counter in the sheet pan, or else the bottoms will pull off the cookies when you take them off. Make sure to use a spatula to remove them from the pan.
Arrange your cookies on a plate, stick in lunches, give as gifts, or hoard them all to yourself and eat them all over the course of a weekend (like I have NEVER done....). Enjoy!

Or, to make these cookies even better...

So you've made the basic box mix cookies, and they're good, but you wanna try to make something a little extra special, indulgent, or just unique. Here's how to do just that!
First, choose a flavor combo that sounds good:
Mint chocolate (Chocolate cake + mint chocolate chips) [pictured]
Chocolate and peanut butter (chocolate cake mix + peanut butter chips)
Snickerdoodle (vanilla cake mix + cinnamon sugar)
Apple pie (Spice cake + chopped apple)
Strawberry ripple (strawberry cake + strawberry jam)
S'Mores (chocolate cake + marshmallows + graham crackers)
Chocolate covered strawberry ( strawberry cake + dark chocolate chips)

and so on...

Preheat your oven as before

Gather your ingredients as before, with the addition of any mix-ins/toppings you want to add.

If you're using a candy bar, or something that might be too large to use whole, chop to the rough size of chocolate chips. Add your mix-ins to the bowl and mix to the same consistency as before (scoopable, not pourable).

Dose out the cookie dough as before. This would be the time to add toppings (cinnamon sugar, graham cracker bits, toasted nuts, etc.).

Slide the pan into the oven and bake for the time indicated under "cupcakes". These took 16 minutes in my oven, per batch.

Let the cookies cool completely, plate them up, and enjoy!
Feel free to explore and make these cookies your own, invent your own combos, and show me what you come up with!